The secretary disappeared through an inner door. It seemed not more
than ten seconds before he was back. "The Inspector will see you, sir."

Keith drew a deep breath to quiet the violent beating of his heart. In
spite of all his courage he felt upon him the clutch of a cold and
foreboding hand, a hand that seemed struggling to drag him back. And
again he heard Conniston's dying voice whispering to him, "REMEMBER,
OLD CHAP, YOU WIN OR LOSE THE MOMENT MCDOWELL FIRST SETS HIS EYES ON
YOU!"

Was Conniston right?

Win or lose, he would play the game as the Englishman would have played
it. Squaring his shoulders he entered to face McDowell, the cleverest
man-hunter in the Northwest.



V

Keith's first vision, as he entered the office of the Inspector of
Police, was not of McDowell, but of a girl. She sat directly facing him
as he advanced through the door, the light from a window throwing into
strong relief her face and hair. The effect was unusual. She was
strikingly handsome. The sun, giving to the room a soft radiance, lit
up her hair with shimmering gold; her eyes, Keith saw, were a clear and
wonderful gray--and they stared at him as he entered, while the poise
of her body and the tenseness of her face gave evidence of sudden and
unusual emotion. These things Keith observed in a flash; then he turned